


Oceans

by Novantinuum (ChromaticDreams)



Series: Brandishing the Star: A Crystal Gem's Guide to the Universe (SU shorts) [22]
Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: Additional Warnings In Author's Note, Canon Compliant, Character Study, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Mental Health Issues, Post-Episode: s06e19 I Am My Monster, everyone is understandably pretty stressed right now
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-16
Updated: 2021-03-17
Packaged: 2021-03-19 00:41:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 5,358
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29498994
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ChromaticDreams/pseuds/Novantinuum
Summary: Her fingers clutch onto the folds of his blanket with a protective fervor, but they’re still trembling. Stars, they’re trembling.Wordlessly, he understands. His are too.-A series of shorts detailing what might've happened in the moments afterI Am My Monster,told from six different points of view.
Relationships: Andy DeMayo & Greg Universe, Connie Maheswaran & Priyanka Maheswaran, Garnet & Pearl (Steven Universe)
Series: Brandishing the Star: A Crystal Gem's Guide to the Universe (SU shorts) [22]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1491011
Comments: 53
Kudos: 77





	1. Steven

**Author's Note:**

> Chapter warning: Given that it's from Steven's POV, this short contains a sum of self-depreciation.

He’s going home.

Everyone is. The Diamonds make quick work lifting their ship up out of the water, promising to call to check in on his condition later before leaving him in the privacy of his immediate family and friends. The Cluster offers her support as long as she’s physically able before her form begins to flicker, a clear sign she needs to retreat into the Earth’s core to rest. Thankfully though, she stays long enough to ferry them closer to shore, allowing his dad and the others easy access to the beach. Garnet helps lift him (because in the present moment he’s nothing but dead weight, entirely useless, as per usual) upon Lion’s back in front of Connie just before their makeshift platform disappears. His shivering, exhausted body— all but drained empty by the monumental force of his earlier transformation— is swaddled in nothing but a thin blanket. If he still had any sense of dignity left within him this might make him feel uncomfortably exposed, but in this present situation he’s not sure he even has room in his soul to internalize yet another scrap of shame. 

Stars knows he’s already made enough of a scene today. 

His throat grows thick as he threads his hand through Lion’s fur, initially hesitating in his touch as he fights away staticky memories of those awful, tapered claws, gouging deep troughs in the sand. The one silver lining about all this is that his body isn’t glowing neon pink anymore. At least... not for now. He’s sure he’ll struggle with it again later. In fact, he’ll probably be stuck struggling with it for the rest of his life, because even all the loving, comforting words in the world can’t change the fact that at the end of the day he’s still a shattering _monster—_ didn’t they see him, angrily thrashing away at the hillside, rushing towards them with nothing but the thrum of blind vengeance pounding through his distorted state of consciousness??— and he can’t see how he’ll ever stop being one. It’ll happen again, he’s sure of it. He’s dangerous. He’s a time bomb, he has to be contained. Controlled. And yet his heart’s hammering in his chest with such an unkempt ferocity that he’s honestly surprised he _can’t_ feel that sickeningly familiar thrum of hard-light pooling like an endless ocean just under the surface, tinting his skin, electrifying his nerves, flooding his mind with so much raw energy that he’s left disoriented and breathless...

He clamps his eyes shut so tight his temples throb, and desperately swerves his focus to the softness of Lion’s mane caught in his grip. 

Sitting behind him, Connie immediately senses the distress billowing off him in waves. Of course she does. After all, that’s all their relationship has been for the past few months, right? Him being some mentally disturbed burden and her continuously running to comfort him. Unbalanced. It’s hardly fair. She deserves so much better than this mess.

“I’ve got ya’,” she reassures regardless, wrapping one of her arms around his chest. Her fingers clutch onto the folds of his blanket with a protective fervor, but they’re still trembling. Stars, they’re trembling. 

Wordlessly, he understands. His are too.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh boy, is this Jen starting to post _another_ story full of shorts BEFORE they've finished the last one? For shame, Jen. Maybe one day you'll learn. XD
> 
> Anyways, I _swear_ I'll finish the last two chapters for Second Skin soon, but it's my birthday and I couldn't help but start to post these shorts I've been working on lately as a treat to myself. The rest of the characters will become relevant in later chapters. I'm writing a chapter from Garnet, Pearl, Connie, Amethyst, and Greg's POVs too. Tagged relationships are those who will end up having conversations at later points in the fic. I'll post the next chapter in a few days. Thanks for reading, all! <3


	2. Garnet

Garnet swears a tangible hush falls upon her power of foresight at the precise moment Lion carries the boy across the splintered threshold of the beach house.

Traditionally, it’s rare that she’d immediately recognize the precise element causing her future vision to grow fuzzy and indistinct, but given the whirlwind of events she’s witnessed today within a mere hour’s time it’d be hard not to realize the fact that everything about her current blindness ultimately circles back to Steven. After all, the futures where he _didn’t_ remain within that corruption-like form for the rest of his days were but dim, unlikely scenarios only a few minutes ago. And a few more minutes before that, she hadn’t the foresight to see that jarring transformation coming whatsoever. Not even at the extreme fringes of possibility.

So clearly, this means her current perception of him is inaccurate. Has woefully stagnated. _Again,_ she thinks, the distinct facets of her soul falling into silent turmoil upon realization that this is the second time this has happened, that she’s irrevocably failed him by making the same mistake twice, by not providing the support he needed simply because she was ignorant to the reality of his true plight. Somewhere, there exists a singular moment wherein he made the conscious decision not to trust her with his true emotions. And ultimately, if he deemed her unfit to be open about his inner struggles with, that reveals a critical fault in her own attempts at communication. 

_And I don’t want any more ‘high and mighty’ advice from Garnet,_ that cactus’s prickly voice rings solid in her mind, shedding clear light on her shortcomings as a mentor.

With her outward expression no more revealing than lips curved into a troubled frown, Garnet gathers the weary young hybrid in her arms to carry him up the steps to his bedroom. Even without future vision to guide her path, she doubts keeping him downstairs in plain sight of the worst of the wreckage would contribute helpfully to his fragile mental state. No one else makes an immediate move to follow her except Pearl, who’s muttering something about finding his pajamas. Meanwhile, Greg’s and Amethyst are attempting to sweep up glass, their expressions unquestionably haunted by what’s taken place, and Connie is pacing back and forth on the beach just outside, her phone pressed to her ear. As for Bismuth, Lapis, and Peridot, they’ve long since left for Little Homeworld to retrieve repair supplies. They’re all helping, in their own little ways. More importantly, they’re allowing Steven space as they try and cope themselves. None of them can allow themselves to fall apart in his presence anymore. 

None of them can allow themselves to be yet another problem for him to fix. Especially not now, not when he’s struggling.

Not when he can barely hold his head above the crest of these waves.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Garnet's tricky to write, and I've only written from her POV once before, but it was a fun challenge. I'll post the third short this Saturday!


	3. Pearl

“I know where his pajamas are, I’ll get them,” Pearl says once they’ve returned to the drafty, newly remodeled (albeit by tragic, unexpected accident) main room of the beach house, dutifully following Garnet up the stairs.

She’s almost thankful no one bothers to mention the obvious fact that— since the four of them living here switch out on chores like laundry and sweeping and dishes from week to week, and Steven’s kept his pajamas in the exact same drawer for years— _everyone_ knows where his pajamas are. Thus, it would be silly to claim this as a task only she could carry out. In her case, though, she knows it’s not the task itself that matters so much as it’s the act of feeling in control of something.

_Anything._

She’ll take literally anything at this fraught, emotionally charged moment in time.

In the teen’s bedroom, Garnet gently lays him down atop his comforter (his now sleeping form still enveloped in that blanket for dignity’s sake) as Pearl slides open the top drawer of his dresser to retrieve the first pair of sweatpants she can find. She doesn’t bother with underwear— figuring Steven would prefer putting that on himself when he’s conscious again— and instead works together with Garnet to move a portion of the blanket’s folds aside as she quickly slips the soft, cottony pants over his legs.

She doesn’t notice the pale pink marks spread in familiar patterns across certain expanses of his skin until she’s lifting his torso up from the mattress, intending to pull a night shirt over his head. 

The first ones she sees are at his elbows, thin, about an inch long, and situated directly over the joints. Once she’s catalogued these away in her mind, however, an uneasy tension settling deep within her gem, it’s impossible to ignore the identical scarring running in jagged, parallel lines from his shoulders all the way to the small of his back. Or the marks just barely hidden in his hairline, situated right where those crystalline horns were, in the fearsome, towering creature he became. Caught amidst the consuming waves of emotional fragility today’s harrowing experience has carried in with the tide, it’s all but impossible for Pearl to hide the full spectrum of her anguish and despair. Her breath hitches as she rushes to cover up these stark, physical reminders of Steven’s delicate mental condition, of her failure to properly care for him in the loving, selfless, understanding manner he always deserved. In the end, that’s the crux of the issue, isn’t it? She failed him. His own father entrusted him to her guidance and care, and she was so tangled within threads of her own deep-rooted traumas that she couldn’t successfully carry this duty through.

“Pearl,” Garnet’s even, grounding voice cuts through the dense fog of her own self-loathing, in that special sort of tone she often uses that somehow wordlessly encourages trust and vulnerability.

She doesn’t respond immediately, instead pausing to carefully thread her fingers through some flyaway curls laying askew by Steven’s temples, brushing them back behind his ears.

(One of the very few things in this present situation she can exert some conscious degree of control over, can work to _fix.)_

“I... I didn’t see it coming,” she finally says, strained. “None of us did. Not really. I knew he was hurting, but I- we couldn’t help him. We _pushed_ him towards this.” Inhaling deeply, she turns to face her directly. “What does that say about us?” 

“It says that we’re flawed,” Garnet begins, raising her hand to her face to dissipate her visor. There’s melancholy in the eyes she’s just uncovered, a guilt that perfectly matches the sharp twisting nestled at her own core. “That we still have a lot to learn about how to care for one another.”

Pearl’s shoulders hunch inwards as she sighs, knowing as intimately as she can recognize the curves and blemishes of her own gem that her dear friend is absolutely correct.

“But... it also means we must learn how to better care for ourselves,” she continues, and gestures between the two of them. “That we mustn’t let ourselves wallow in guilt.” Her lips pursed, she reaches towards the sleeping boy nestled on the bed in front of them, and ruffles an affectionate hand through his tangled hair. “We may be unable to change the past, but we can work towards a healthier future. For all of us.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> New chapter (with some Connie time!) to come within the next week. Thank you for reading! <3


	4. Connie

Connie paces the shore a good few yards away from the base of the beach house, clutching her phone to her ear in a grip so tight it’s left her fingers trembling from muscle strain.

The line rings once. Twice. Thrice. Every pause between those high pitched trilling tones carries yet another rush of anxiety, filling her basin ever fuller against her wishes. Her head thrums with the aura of migraine, a side effect of her stress that’s become disconcertingly common as of late. _(It’s the tension,_ she reminds herself with a quiet sigh. She’s clenching the muscles of her face and limbs rigid far too often.)

“Mom?” she says when the call finally goes through, her voice strained with indescribable exhaustion. 

The sheer unprofessional urgency in which her mother responds honestly stresses her out even more... so, so different from her usual levelheaded demeanor. It’s obvious, then, that she must have been fearfully expecting this call.

“Connie? What’s—“

“Mom, y-you know how you said to let you know if there were any more incidents? With, uh... with the swelling?”

“Oh. Oh, goodness. Is he okay?” she asks. “Are _you_ okay??” she quickly adds before her mouth can bob open to reply to her first query. The question probably stems from blind parental worry more than anything. In her mind, though, it should be obvious she’s physically okay if ‘I’m hurt’ isn’t the important detail she leads with.

“Yes, he’s—“ she shifts her phone to her other ear, her right hand shaking too much at this point that she’s afraid she’ll drop it— “no one’s hurt. We’re fine. Well, not _fine,_ but... not in immediate danger, I guess.” She swallows hard, her throat growing progressively more narrow as she attempts to stammer out a somewhat useful explanation. “Things got messy, though, a-a-and I still don’t know how to feel about it, or what to do, and I-I’m—“

“Kahaani, love. Take a deep breath for me. You’re safe, yes?”

Initially struggling to wrest control of her respiration’s sharp pace, Connie pauses for a few moments. She distracts herself from her swarming anxieties by watching the tide wash in, its motion constant and reassuringly cyclical. Recent memories— of that creature thrashing, clawing, and roaring amidst the water, only held back by the Cluster’s might— almost threaten to overwhelm her, but in the end it’s just a thought. It can’t control her, right? It... it can’t control her.

“You’re okay,” the voice on the other side of the call affirms. “And I’m listening.”

The world’s still standing. The sun still shines. Despite every living nightmare today has offered, she’s still here. 

“Now,” her mom leads gently. “What happened?”

She swallows hard.

“The swelling, it... well, it kinda got worse,” she says. “When he came home, he was pink again, and at first he kept swelling up like before, but then... He kept saying all these really negative things about himself, that he’s a fraud, a _monster,_ and—“

“And... what?”

Her words sinks into a hoarse whisper as she desperately tries not to relive this horrifying reality all over again. “And then he just... exploded, and turned into one.”

“You mean, he—“

“I mean it literally, Mom!” she interjects before her mother can try to rationalize her words in terms of human medical knowledge, a futile activity. “I’m not just being metaphoric, here! He grew taller than the entire hillside. He was covered in scales, and spikes, a-and he seemed to barely recognize us.”

There’s a long, nauseating pause as her mother drinks in this information.

“Is— he still in this form?” she eventually manages, her tone strained.

“No. Thankfully, no. We got him back. I don’t know how we managed it, but he’s safe. He’s resting now. But some of the others are worried about how this might’ve impacted his health, since he’s half-organic. I think...” Connie closes her eyes, inhaling briefly before continuing. “I saw scarring, when we were moving him back to the house. And honestly, I don’t really know what I should do now. About anything.”

“Connie, I’m coming over the second my shift ends, okay? Just... hang in there for an hour longer. I’ll bring some equipment so we can check on his vitals, and we’ll go from there.”

“Okay,” she replies, and wipes relieved tears from her cheeks. “See you soon.”

“I love you, honey.“

“Love you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Connie deserves ten thousand hugs after having to experience the stress of watching her best friend have a messy breakdown. Maybe one day I'll write a fic from either her or Greg's POV about what their immediate reaction was to Steven's transformation while it was taking place, because... o u c h. They must have been absolutely terrified.
> 
> Almost done with the last chapter of this. It's... growing far longer than I anticipated, though, ahah. Apparently I have a lot of feelings about Greg. XD


	5. Amethyst

Amethyst and Greg’s clean-up work in the living room of the beach house is slow and silent, at first. More specifically, it’s cautious. Methodological. There’s a lot of glass and splintered wood strewn across the floorboards, and neither of them wish to leave any sharp fragments behind. It’s a safety thing first and foremost— they’ve gotta prep the space for Bismuth to begin her swift repairs, and to ensure the humans don’t hurt themselves on those piercing shards— but at least for Amethyst, (she can’t speak for Greg, as in what she can only assume is delayed shock for everything that’s happened today he’s barely uttered a word since Steven was carried upstairs), it’s equal parts a self-care thing. 

Because she doesn’t _want_ to see those shards. 

She doesn’t _want_ her surroundings to remind her at every turn and avenue about all this inner turmoil her little brother’s carrying aloft, continuously weighing down upon his shoulders and forcibly submerging him under the riptide as he desperately swims for shore, towards the faintest promise of relief.

Tragically, he didn’t reach that beach in time today.

Instead, the ocean’s cruelty marooned him. It almost marooned _all_ of them, washing them away in its violent surf, forcing them to their knees in the face of the cold, blunt truth of Steven’s trauma. Stars, she’s not sure what any of them would’ve done without Connie rushing in on Lion’s back to cut through the shadow of their self-centered despair and remind them of their duty to him as his family. She really owes the kid, that’s for sure.

The shards, though. No matter how many shards she sweeps into that dust pan, she swears the scattered piles strewn across the floorboards just keep growing deeper, and deeper, and deeper, until she might as well be drowning in them. Her normally sturdy hands quiver around the broom handle, her breath hitching as she’s harshly thrust into the nightmare of the recent past. This is about where she stood, when... w-when everything went horribly wrong not less than an hour ago. She can still hear his manic, desperate voice clashing amidst her memory, rambling ceaselessly without pause for breath.

_“I can just keep messing up and fixing things forever, and you'll never have to know or think about any of it!”_

Amethyst bites hard at her lower lip. If she’d eaten anything today, she’s sure she’d feel sick right about now. The bitter insecurities he confessed to, the offenses he claimed he committed—

_“—but it’s not like I actually went **through** with it!” he quickly exclaims about his earlier admissions of harboring revenge fantasies about White, a shaky laugh (almost sounding like a cry) leaking through his rapidly crumbling facade. “I- I only **actually** shattered Jasper!”_

It’s impossible for her mind not to wander after remembering the grim details of that scene, and the next time she glances towards the floor, the sharp fragments remaining are orange. The room spins in her sight, the glass suddenly assailing her from all directions. A flurry of disjointed images she dreads to entertain flicker through her subconscious. Beta. Jasper. Corruption, spreading in thick blotchy patches across her form as she screams for the memory of her Diamond, lays every last vulnerability bare in the face of her hopelessness. Spikes violently erupting from Steven’s back as he falls to that same dark place.

_“I’m a fraud,” he whispers brokenly._

_“No, you’re not!”_ she desperately wishes she’d clamored in return.

Amethyst sighs heavily, and leans her broom against the kitchen table. 

“I’m takin’ a break,” she mutters to Greg from across the room, and slowly advances towards the warp pad beyond the living room.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dunno when I'll post the last chapter- it's still halfway finished, but I'm coming up to final exam season, (my last set of final exams for my whole college career), so I may or may not complete it quickly. Who knows. It's getting far longer than expected, ahah. 
> 
> Anyways, thank you for reading! Comments are always cherished with my whole heart <3


	6. Greg

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yeah, so. Greg really hogged the spotlight. This was supposed to be brief, and instead it came out as 2.2K words. XD
> 
> Chapter warning: Allusions to past non-canon character suicide.

Hours pass.

Bismuth makes quick and quiet work of replacing the cracked slider door in Steven’s room while he sleeps, and secures a thick tarp over the open front of the house to keep the coastal breeze somewhat at bay until she can finish her repairs to the windows and siding. She warns that might take a day or two. Garnet, meanwhile, busies herself the rest of the afternoon and evening fielding all of the Diamonds’ frazzled calls, and reassuring them of the boy’s current stability. Pooling their knowledge, Dr. Maheswaran and Peridot make sure to confirm that. Beyond some minor scarring, neither his organic or Gem half seems to exhibit any serious physical health conditions in consequence of what happened today, news which works to ever so slightly lift the air of the household. With no other concrete tasks to complete, Pearl, Amethyst, Lapis, Connie, and Greg all rotate between sweeping debris off the floor, wandering the beach to mentally recuperate, and dutifully sitting at Steven’s side as he rests. It may not sound like a lot, but alas the level of emotional labor demanded by such a situation is immense. 

All in all, the sun’s long since dipped below the horizon by the time Greg finally collapses onto the mattress laid out in the back of his van, craving if but a moment of privacy and respite from all the chaos. It’s been... an insufferably long day, to put it lightly. Busy. Tons of cleaning, and intercepting nosy neighbors, and bedside monitoring...

He offered to take the first night shift watching Steven a few minutes ago, but Pearl must’ve noticed the dark circles creeping ever wider under his eyes, because she proceeded to gently overturn his offer and remind him of humanity’s daily sleep requirement. And she’s right, of course. He can’t stay up as long as he used to in his twenties anymore. Plus, he probably deserves some time to himself after everything that’s transpired. There’s plenty of Gems left in the house who can keep watch, after all. Steven will be fine for a few hours. Surely nothing else can happen when he’s asleep, right?

_Right??_

Exhaustedly slumping against the side wall, Greg offers a glassy, vacant stare at the contacts list of his phone, roughly wiping the damp from his cheeks with his other hand as his thumb hovers over one of the numbers. Does he dare drag someone else into this whole situation? Surely the kinder solution would be to refrain from widening the circle any more, from letting anyone else learn about today’s harrowing events. And yet if he fails to find a proper outlet for the raw emotions all of this has violently hauled to the surface, he fears he just may suffer a mental break himself, repressed memories bursting like a vicious flood through the dam he desperately tried to seal them behind all those years back. Much of this is just... far too familiar.

His phone slips right through his trembling hands as the cruel reality of what he witnessed today finally begins to carve its indelible presence in his mind. A strained sob leaking from between his tightly pursed lips, he buries his head between his knees, clutching at the worn bottom hem of his jean shorts like an infant to a parent’s finger. Small. Vulnerable. 

Helpless.

His son... _oh stars, his only son, he—_

He can’t talk about any of this to the Gems; they wouldn’t wholly grasp the uniquely human nature of his concerns. And he doesn’t feel comfortable discussing these matters with Dr. Maheswaran, especially not after the stern words she dealt to him back at the hospital. He’s burdened her enough already, by this point. No, there’s only one fellow human he feels close enough with to engage in this sort of conversation.

Taking a deep, cleansing breath, he reaches for the phone he dropped on the mattress. Turns it on. Nervously clamps down on his bottom lip as he selects his cousin’s contact and dials.

The passing heartbeats slamming against his ribs are almost nauseating in their needy clamor as he waits, his calloused fingers tapping against the thick rubber of his phone case. Andy’s never been a particularly tech savvy guy, so honestly, it’s well within reason he might not even carry his phone on his person to answer. And that’d be fine, really. In fact, he might even prefer it, since he’s still not confident he’s emotionally prepared to discuss any of this at this precise moment, anyways. But just as he’s beginning to undergo mental preparations for what on _Earth_ he might leave as a voicemail message, his older family member finally picks up.

“Greg?” Andy’s gravelly voice rings through, sounding somewhat tinny through their connection. “Hey, it’s been a while, hasn’t it? How’s the ol’ Universe family unit doin’?”

“Not great, honestly,” he narrowly manages in response, his throat constricting tight. “That’s kinda why I’m calling, if you have the time to listen?”

“Heh. I’m a drifter, you know I ain’t got no schedule. Carry on.”

“Well... geeze, how do I put this. There was, uh... a bit of an incident today. With Steven.”

“An incident?” his cousin questions, marked worry immediately painting his tone. “The kid okay??”

He falls silent for a few seconds upon this question, threading his hyperactive digits through the split ends in his hair on automatic, a stress-induced habit. “Unclear,” he says, a slight quiver making itself intimately known in his words. “I mean, physically, at the moment, yes, but—“

He cuts off once more. It suddenly occurs to him that little of today’s events would make sense to Andy without providing the appropriate context. Or, at least, what little context he’s capable of giving as a father. It’s still terrifying to admit the truth to himself— that he _doesn’t_ possess the full story. That he hasn’t been paying close enough attention. That, in many ways, he willfully blinded himself to all the troubling events transpiring around his son throughout the years, foolishly believing that if he didn’t involve himself... that if he simply stayed out of the Gems’ hair... everything would go to plan, and Steven would finally receive the training he needed. He didn’t expect things would grow so complicated.

He didn’t expect that his teenage son would have to march into battle carrying nothing but his wits and a shield time and time again.

With a weary sigh and a quick apology, to which Andy brushes off, Greg begins to weave a verbal picture of everything that’s transpired across the last few days. First, the hospital call. Rushing home from tour, only to find his son giant and flushed pink, literally filling an entire room with the sheer volume of his trauma. The shattered x-ray in his chart, hinting towards hidden hurts that— before all this— even Steven seemingly hadn’t processed or quantified. Then, the road trip. The unwanted reminders of his childhood. That _blasted_ CD. His expression sobers as he describes the fateful argument they had on the road home, one which lead to his son accidentally breaking the steering wheel and flipping the van. Next... his disappearance. No texts for four whole days, which is so unlike him. He was worried sick. And the next time he saw him, he was eight feet tall, glowing, and painfully manic in behavior, with each new sentence spilling from his mouth revealing an even more heartbreaking picture of the sort of poor mental state he’d spiraled into. It was nothing short of a father’s worst nightmare, propelled into horrifying, vivid reality. 

Nothing in this corner of the galaxy could’ve prepared him for the primal surge of terror and anguish he was engulfed within when that nightmare distorted and transformed even further. 

~~His only son... colossal and coated in thick scales and spines, sclera black as night... roughly clawing at this unfamiliar form, smashing his skull against the cliffside, roaring with an inner pain so primal that the sound now haunts the depths of his very soul~~ —

“I- you remember what happened with cousin Jo, back when we were young?” Greg says softly once he’s caught Andy up with the details of situation, his voice frail and unsteady, the tone of a man helplessly marooned amidst his anxieties. “Before she was sent to that mental rehab place? Well, I’m... with the addition of Gem magic, it almost felt like that. I mean, h-he’s fine for _now,_ we have him resting, but... but I’m just so _scared_ he won’t come out of this, like her, a-a-and that one day he’ll—“

A mewling sob bubbles up in his throat, swiftly severing that train of thought. N-no. _No,_ he refuses to even _utter_ that horrible idea out loud! After all, a world without Steven in it isn’t worth envisioning.

Andy’s eventual response— albeit tinged with a justified shade of awkwardness, given the emotionally charged nature of this conversation— is filled with genuine compassion, and for that he’s dearly thankful.

“Aw, hell... Greg, I’m- I’m so sorry. I, uh- I could fly over, if any of ya’ need me? For emotional support, or whatever?”

Upon this kind offer, he inhales deep to steady his breath, and wipes away dewy beads of moisture from the corner of his eyes, desperately hoping that he can mitigate the pitiful wavering of his voice over the phone. He’s gotta fight to reliably keep _some_ form of composure in front of other people, damnit. His kid can’t have his dad breaking down around him too, of course.

“No, you’ve got places to be,” he replies evenly, pressing his thumb and pointer against one of his aching temples. “I couldn’t ask you to do that.”

“You _ain’t_ asking,” he retorts, the eye-roll evident in his tone. “I’m offering. Listen- family takes care of family, y’hear? And I’m only about a day’s flight away, anyways. It’s really the least I could do.”

He sighs. Absentmindedly tugs at a thick strand of his hair. Offers a long, contemplative stare at the rickety age-worn handle affixed to the inside of the van’s back doors. Truth be told— ignoring his deep-seated guilt at dragging Andy into all this to begin with— he’d love having another family member around to embrace, especially a human one who can more deeply understand the crux of his anxieties about this delicate situation. But in the end, he shouldn’t be prioritizing his own feelings and comfort. He’s not the one in crisis, his _son_ is.

Desperately hoping he’s making the right choice, Greg flexes his fingers, and acquiesces to the offer, on one condition: only if Steven consents to having visitors, once he’s awake.

Andy hums in approval. “Understood. Don’t wanna overload the poor guy with any surprise visits, or whatever.”

“Yeah. The last thing I want to do is push him too hard, too fast.”

He pauses, braving waves of parental grief to spend a moment to reflect on Steven’s emotional progression over the past few months... a stray negative comment here, an unusually forlorn mannerism there... All of them events that, in isolation, wouldn’t point to anything more than your standard ‘teenage angst,’ but when observed in strong, unceasing patterns, begin to reveal deeply harrowing truths about the state of an individual’s self-image. How did he never notice? Why wasn’t he there to catch him in his fall?

“I think he _hates_ himself,” he says quietly, his voice hitching up at the end. “He didn’t say so directly, but- but I can sense it. And I don’t know how to help him, I-I... I don’t know if I _can.”_

“Nonsense,” his cousin scoffs, “‘course ya’ know what to do! What does any good father worth their salt give their sons?”

Unable to evade the momentary temptation of feeling miserable and sorry for himself, he slumps back against the wall, giving a weak shrug that his current audience would never see.

“I dunno, maybe a stable, safe childhood? Not growing up poor as dirt in a van?”

 _“No,_ you numbskull,” Andy immediately cuts back, “you love on ‘em and support ‘em just as much as you always have! Y’ show him that you’re always gonna be there for him, and that he can trust you with anything.”

“But I _haven’t_ always been there for him,” he exclaims petulantly. “That’s the whole problem! That’s one of the reasons he ended up like this.”

“Greg,” he says, his voice softer this time. “Listen to me, ain’t nobody perfect, okay? We’ve all made our mistakes with people. Me? More than most. But what we can’t do is let those mistakes cloud what’s happening right now. Y’know, that’s one of the hard lessons I’ve had to learn over the past two years, that you can’t always make things about you. Because right now, it’s about _him._ He’s dealin’ with some hard feelings, and he needs all of our help. So, let’s help him. Together. We’ll start with one foot in front of us, and we can take it from there. All right?”

Closing his weary, exhausted eyes and pressing his thumb firm against his still-aching temple, Greg Universe gives a long sigh and finally concedes to the reality that— just as he’s not solely responsible for the decline of his son’s mental state— no man should be an island when it comes to the task of supporting one’s journey towards recovery. As with everything, the extended Universe family unit will face the future together, hand-in-hand. Step-by-step.

“Yeah,” he breathes. “Yeah, I think that’s do-able.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you very much for reading and supporting this lil' project over the past few weeks! It's been a fun one to write- exploring a bunch of different POVs is always a good time. Very illuminating.
> 
> I'll be back to working on Second Skin and Crack the Paragon (my AU longfic) after this, so keep an eye out for those soon-ish.


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